Hockey East Journal: Wrong place, wrong time for Warriors

Defenseman Kyle Bigos and the Warriors are winless in their last
five games. (Photo: Merrimack Athletics)

This is the time of year when you want to be playing your best
hockey.

This is not the time of year that Merrimack is finding itself
playing its best hockey.

Just three weeks ago, the Warriors were sitting in first place
in Hockey East, having beaten Boston College 2-1 in overtime on
Feb. 15 to supplant the Eagles atop the standings. It was the
fourth straight win for Merrimack, and the sixth in seven
games.

The Warriors haven’t won a game since.

Merrimack has gone 0-4-1 since that victory over BC, and their
precipitous fall has taken them from first place all the way to
sixth, three points out of home ice for the quarterfinals with only
two games left in the regular season. In a wild and woolly race to
the finish that has seen five teams hold first place at least
temporarily over the last three weeks, Merrimack is the only team
in the upper echelon of the league that has consistently struggled
in this crucial final stretch.

Last weekend, the Warriors surrendered an ill-timed two-game
sweep to UMass-Lowell, which outscored them 7-1 over the two
victories. That put the River Hawks in first place, and made UML
the first Hockey East team to clinch home ice.

“I think it took us too long to join the battle,”
Merrimack coach Mark Dennehy said after Sunday’s 3-1 loss, in
which the River Hawks took a 3-0 lead before allowing just a Shawn
Bates goal early in the third. “I thought once we joined the
battle, we made a game of it, but you’ve got to play hard. I
couldn’t play in that, even back in the day I couldn’t
play in that. Not my type of game. I was pretty soft.”

“Soft” certainly isn’t a good word to describe
the former BC player’s charges. The Warriors are hardly a
finesse team, and their gritty play has suited them well for much
of the year, earning them a respectable 12.7 penalty minutes per
game that puts them in the middle of the Hockey East pack.
They’ve mostly taken care of themselves when the penalties
have been called, as well, with an 86.7 percent kill rate
that’s second best in the league.

But that toughness has also come at a cost. Sunday’s game
winner was scored on the power play by Lowell’s Josh
Holmstrom, who had a bonanza first period, scoring UML’s
first two goals. And Kyle Bigos, Merrimack’s monstrous
defenseman, had trouble staying out of the penalty box. While the
6-foot-5, 235-pound Bigos has struggled with penalties throughout
his career – sometimes simply because his height and size has
made it hard for referees to distinguish between clean checks and
dirty play – he has tightened up his game for much of
2012-13.

Yet all that progress went out the window on Sunday, when Bigos
picked up a game misconduct after the final buzzer after several
players tangled at the end of a chippy game between the Merrimack
Valley neighbors. Although several members of both teams were
involved, only Bigos picked up penalties as a result of the fracas,
and his second game misconduct of the season led to a one-game
suspension, meaning he’s out of the lineup for Friday’s
penultimate regular season game, against UMass.

The frustration, Dennehy said, is beginning to mount for the
Warriors.

Merrimack – along with the rest of the nine teams still in
playoff contention – has just 120 minutes left to get things
sorted out before the quarterfinal series start next week. But
there’s no magic method for the struggling Warriors to turn
their season around, just a simple solution, said Dennehy.

Both players had hat tricks in a crucial weekend for playoff
positioning. Henrion (Holden, Mass.) picked up the first trick of
his collegiate career to lead UNH to a 4-0 win over UMass on
Saturday, which kept them just one point behind first-place Lowell.
Nieto’s natural hat trick polished off a week in which he
scored six goals and one assist over three games, as BU went 2-1-0
to keep hope of home ice alive.

One of the most dramatic Hockey East seasons in recent memory
comes to a close this weekend, and the regular-season title and
playoff positioning are both anything but set. The Friars are
looking to stay in the top 4 and host a quarterfinal series, and if
they can hold on, the River Hawks would be the first team not named
Boston College, Boston University, New Hampshire or Maine to win
the regular season title in the league’s 28-year history.

Power Rankings

1. UMass-Lowell (21-9-2, 15-8-2 HEA) –
The River Hawks’ midseason hiccup seems to be over for sure,
as they’re unbeaten in their last seven after a
60-save-on-61-shot effort from freshman goaltender Connor
Hellebuyck led their sweep of Merrimack last weekend.

2. New Hampshire (18-8-6, 13-7-5 HEA) –
Casey DeSmith (Rochester, N.H.) made 60 saves on
62 UMass shots to preserve a three-point weekend for the Wildcats,
who are unbeaten in their last five (2-0-3).

3. Providence (14-11-7, 12-7-6 HEA) –
Since an inconsistent 7-8-3 start, the Friars have gone 7-3-4, and
still have an outside chance at winning the regular season title
with a three-point weekend against UMass-Lowell.

4. Boston College (19-10-3, 14-9-2 HEA) –
At one point this year, it seemed like BC might never have
double-digit losses, but injuries and a bad run of play have hit
the Eagles hard, and they’ve got just two wins in their last
six games (2-3-1). They also got more bad news, as junior
Kevin Hayes (Dorchester, Mass.) is gone for the
season with a leg injury.

5. Boston University (16-15-2, 13-10-2 HEA)
– Last weekend was sort of a perfect microcosm of BU’s
year. Matt Nieto’s natural hat trick led an
impressive 3-1 win over Vermont on Friday, but on Saturday it was
like the Terriers were up against world-beaters as the Catamounts
rocked them with a 5-2 win, including two goals in the final two
minutes.

6. Merrimack (14-14-6, 12-10-3 HEA) –
Friday’s 4-0 shutout loss to Lowell marked the first time
Merrimack had been held without a goal in 42 games, dating back to
Feb. 10, 2012.

7. Vermont (11-16-5, 8-12-5 HEA) – UVM is
on the wrong side of a sizable chasm between the league’s
elite and the also-rans this year, but the Catamounts are still in
good shape for home ice, with a series against out-of-contention
Northeastern to end the regular season this weekend.

8. Maine (10-17-7, 6-12-7 HEA) – The
Black Bears are 1-1-1 over their last three, and will probably need
at least two points from two games against New Hampshire to stay in
the playoff picture this weekend, but the fact that Maine controls
its own destiny after a catastrophic start is pretty impressive
nonetheless.

9. UMass (11-18-3, 8-15-2 HEA) – The good
news is that the season-ending home-and-home against Merrimack
doesn’t look quite as daunting as it did when the Warriors
were in first place. The bad news is that UMass needs to win
– and needs help – to keep coach John
Micheletto’s first season behind the bench from
ending without a playoff berth.

10. Northeastern (9-19-4, 5-16-4 HEA) –
The Huskies are in an unfortunately familiar place, as they can
only play spoiler in this weekend’s games against Vermont
after being knocked out of the playoffs with last week’s loss
and tie against Maine.